


Truth Is Rarely Pure & Never Simple

by Rinielle



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Be warned: Serious R word splurge ahead, M/M, This is about as angsty as I get., Which is to say: Not very but it's not kittens & rainbows either., that guy can talk man
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-17
Updated: 2013-08-17
Packaged: 2017-12-23 18:05:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,803
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/929474
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rinielle/pseuds/Rinielle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In reality it wasn't actually Enjolras’ fault per se. </p>
<p>Except that everyone wanted to blame someone and really he had been out of line, and so they were going to blame him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Truth Is Rarely Pure & Never Simple

In reality it wasn't actually Enjolras’ _fault_ per se. After all he – like the rest of them – had had no idea why it was that the Patron Minette had made a point of never troubling the Café Musain before; despite the fact that they’d hit almost every other café, shop and house in the area. Nor did he know until a few days after the fact, why they had troubled it that particular night and why they had done it in such spectacular and disastrous fashion. So really, it wasn’t his fault at all. Except that everyone wanted to blame someone and really he had been out of line, and so they were going to blame him. Which was why, when he would much rather be sat reading, alone, in his apartment, or at the very least helping to tidy up in the main two rooms of the coffee shop with the others, he had instead been stuck on scrubbing the lewd messages spray painted onto the walls of the men’s bathroom. Nobody had specifically _said_ that they blamed him, or that that was the reason for his current predicament, but they didn’t really need to. It had been made abundantly clear in the general silence that had greeted his arrival on the scene, and the snappish way in which the normally soft spoken Jehan had assigned him this wonderful task.

He huffed lightly, pausing for a moment to let his arm rest and glaring at the wall ahead of him; as if it was the wall’s fault for allowing someone to graffiti it. Who knew spray paint was so tough to remove? He supposed that was sort of the point, but at this rate, someone – probably him – was going to end up putting a new coat of paint on to cover up the remnants he couldn’t shift. He dipped the scourer pad – now almost entirely dyed red – into the bucket Courfeyrac had forced into his hand, and set back to work. When it became clear that all he was doing now was spreading the colour across the wall rather than getting it off, he reached to the side where he’d been keeping the pile of clean pads, only to come into contact with the floor. He sighed, knowing this meant he would have to venture back out into the main café and endure everyone’s accusatory staring.

A traitorous part of his own mind – that hadn’t stopped chattering since the evening before – told him, again, that he deserved it; meanwhile another beat it with an imaginary club and reminded it that he hadn’t known that Grantaire had some sort of weird reputation and had labelled the Musain ‘off limits’ and that, really, he _had_ been particularly drunk and disruptive that evening and he had every right to say what he said to him. The traitorous part, as ever, refused to be beaten down, and hissed back the words he had said, causing yet another nasty pang of guilt to pass over him.

Enjolras didn’t _do_ guilt as a rule. He prided himself on only ever saying and doing what needed to be said and done, and he always comforted himself with that, but perhaps… maybe he had gone a little too far that night; perhaps cut a little too deep. It hadn’t exactly been his intention for Grantaire to leave; he’d only really wanted to get him to stop rambling on about nothing, distracting the room at large, when they had more important matters to discuss. It certainly hadn’t been his intent for Grantaire not to return again for the whole week; or for him to find some other bar to frequent. It absolutely, most definitely, had not been his intent for Montparnasse and his gang to take that as a lifting of the declaration made on the behalf of the Musain – which, _again_ he had known _nothing_ about – and to practically demolish half the building.

He realised suddenly that he had been staring down at the ruined scourer pad for at least two minutes and frowned to himself, throwing it down beside the bucket and turning to make his way out of the bathroom.

“Finished already?”

Grantaire was leaning unconcernedly against the doorframe; the door itself incidentally was propped up against the far sink. Enjolras glanced back over his shoulder, where there were now several large red smears and the letters ‘-unt’ still intact.

“Not exactly,” he replied, having no idea what else to say. Since guilt wasn’t precisely his thing, apologies weren’t exactly within his skill-set either. Having no clue how to even begin making one, he simply chose not to. Instead he bent down to pick up the pile of ruined pads in order to show he wasn’t simply giving up. Grantaire took one look at them and raised his eyebrows.

“That’s what you’re using?” he asked, apparently not troubling to keep the fact that he thought Enjolras was an idiot a secret. Which was pretty much par for the course for him, Enjolras wasn’t sure why it got to him as much as it did, he really should be used to it by now.

“I’m using what I was given,” he snapped back, dropping the scourer pads back to the floor with little care for where they landed.

“Is that just warm water?” when Enjolras nodded he hissed in a breath, “Wow, someone must be really mad at you,”

“Why’s that exactly?”

“Well…” he shrugged and gestured at the wall. Enjolras didn’t look behind him again, he hadn’t really needed to check the first time, he knew he wasn’t exactly making progress; he simply glared at Grantaire, who coughed and continued. “It’s just, well, that’s some pretty crappy paint, but it’s been up a few days, so you need a proper cleaning agent.”

“Like?” asked Enjolras tightly, glaring now over Grantaire’s shoulder, though none of his so called friends were within his eye line, he hoped they could still feel the intensity.

“Well if you put some acetone onto a wet cloth that’d probably take it off within a few minutes,” he replied, shifting slightly uncomfortably, “Seriously did nobody tell you that? Courfeyrac knows. He’s done community with me a couple of times courtesy of being caught at one of our many protests – thanks for that by the way – we’ve had to clear up some real rubbish from idiots who think they’re the next Banksy or something, there was this one wall where… where are you going?” Enjolras, who had been silently fuming, and had therefore missed everything said after Courfeyrac’s name had been mentioned, now stormed across the room and was already past Grantaire and half way down the corridor that led back to the front room of the café. He pushed open the door and ignored the way the room went silent upon his arrival; really how long were they going to continue with this? He strode purposefully across the room, not looking at any of them as he approached the large box of cleaning products not currently in use; sure enough tucked away with everything else was a white bottle with Acetone written in large unfriendly red letters on its side. He grabbed it, along with several cloths, and marched back across the room, throwing an angry look in Courfeyrac’s direction; the man in question was studying the large patch of rubble he’d apparently been sweeping with great intensity.

By the time he got back to the men’s bathroom Grantaire had ventured into the room itself and had positioned himself atop the counters for the sinks; he was swinging his legs back and forth as if absolutely nothing was wrong.

“Got some then,” Enjolras held the bottle up as he passed in lieu of actually answering. He wasn’t sure he could be trusted not to snap. He threw the cloths down into the bucket, with a ferocity they probably didn’t deserve and went about trying to get the cap off the bottle of acetone. It was proving a little stubborn, and with his arms already aching from the scrubbing, and not being particularly strong even at full fitness, it simply wasn’t budging.

“God dammit!”

He slammed the bottle down on the counter top, letting it go and leaning back, trying to calm down.

“Bad day?” he grit his teeth, determined, utterly determined that he wasn’t going to shout, no matter how irritated he got, no, he wasn’t making that mistake again.

“You could say that,” he ground out, running a hand through blond curls that were currently specked with red from the numerous other times he had run his fingers through it without thinking.

“How’d you end up on bathroom clean-up anyway?” asked Grantaire, shuffling over a sink so that he was sat next to Enjolras. “Who’d you piss off?”

He sighed, and folded his arms across his chest before turning to face the man beside him, “You apparently, last week, hence all this” he said gesturing to the room, and Grantaire tried to arrange his features to appear surprised and curious, but he was a little too slow, “You can drop it, they all know,” said Enjolras tiredly, and Grantaire jumped slightly and gave him an apologetic look instead.

They had found a nice little calling card tucked away at the back of the broken till. Aside from several rather graphic threats and a general message of ‘so fuck you, you pretentious twats’ there had been some interesting allusions to a sort of secret bodyguard who until recently had been keeping them all safe. It didn’t take long for the combination of Combeferre’s quick mind and Courfeyrac’s ability to get gossip out of anyone, to first arrive at the idea that their invisible protector was non-other than Grantaire, and then to confirm it by asking around at some of his old haunts.

A young girl called Eponine – who incidentally had appeared later that afternoon to ‘help clean up’ but had really spent most of the time chattering away to Marius – had told them of a certain altercation between Grantaire and Gueulemer, the ‘Hercules’ and general muscle of the Patron Minette. An altercation that had begun with Grantaire sitting in someone’s seat, and ended somewhat surprisingly in Gueulemer passed out beside it while R himself ordered another bottle of wine.

Now that they were face to face again, Enjolras couldn’t help but sweep his gaze over the man beside him; in an attempt to see if there was something he had missed every day Grantaire had passed his time at their meetings. There didn’t seem to be any physical attribute that he hadn’t noticed before; not that he made a general study of any of his friends’ physical attributes. Still, the slightly shabbily dressed, relatively small – at least in comparison to someone like Gueulemer – scruffy haired man, sat on a counter in the men’s bathroom, hardly seemed capable of taking anyone out in a fight, never mind the tank of a man who formed one of the four corners of the ‘dreaded’ Patron Minette. Then again, Enjolras knew very little about fist-fights. Grantaire certainly bore evidence of perhaps having been in fights before, namely his nose looked as though it had been broken more than once, and rolled up sleeves revealed a particularly long scar from the back of his left wrist, almost to his elbow. Still, Enjolras had in the past – if he thought about them at all – put that evidence down to accidents whilst Grantaire was inebriated out of his mind.

However, when he had scoffed at Eponine’s tale she had rounded on him so fiercely he had been half _forced_ to believe her when she said she didn’t tell lies. Nobody else seemed to have any problem with believing the story, and she explained that a few weeks later she had overheard Montparnasse telling his little gang that the Café Musain was off limits; the dates – according to Combeferre who kept thorough records of such things – corresponded exactly with the week Grantaire had first begun attending their meetings. It also coincided with a distinct rise in violent acts attributed to the Patron Minette, which Eponine put down to Montparnasse being… to use her exact phrasing ‘butt-hurt’. At that Enjolras had tried pointing out that she was being very dismissive about the problem, but by then, almost everyone in the room had come to the conclusion that since it was obvious Grantaire had been their shield – and since it was obvious that Enjolras had been the one to drive him away – it was, therefore, obviously Enjolras’ fault that the café had been attacked, and they had all shushed him. He had left shortly afterwards, feeling irritated; at first he thought because of his friends’ reactions, but, much later, he had realised that the feeling was directed more at himself; he recognised the unusual appearance of guilt.

“I’m sorry,”

Enjolras glanced up in surprise from where he’d been staring at his shoes. Grantaire was, in turn, staring at the half demolished cubicles that sat along the far wall.

“What?” he asked, the question is loud, and echoes slightly around the room, and he really didn’t _mean_ for it to sound snappish or demanding. He started to wonder whether that was how he always sounds or whether that was just how he always sounds when he talked to Grantaire specifically. Grantaire flinched slightly regardless of Enjolras’ intent, and that horrible guilty feeling clenched in his chest again. He really didn’t like it, and would have very much liked to go back to a time when he didn’t know what it felt like.

“I shouldn’t have left,” he said, wringing his hands together; they were shaking somewhat, and Enjolras realised suddenly that he must be sober. He couldn’t remember when it became impossible to tell whether Grantaire was drunk or not from his general demeanour – he was astonishingly eloquent regardless of the quantity of alcohol he consumed – and he began to wonder if he had ever really seen the man sober before. The thought might have annoyed him once, but instead, staring at his shaking hands, he couldn’t feel anything but sad and very slightly ashamed. “Or at least,” Grantaire continued, “I should have been a little less obvious about my having left. Honestly I don’t know what I was thinking, I apologise,”

“ _You_ apologise?” replied Enjolras, spinning on the spot and gripping the edge of the counter, staring directly into Grantaire’s eyes; blue, he noticed.  “Why on earth should _you_ apologise? After what I said to you,”

Grantaire shrugged, “You’ve said worse before,”

At those words, stated matter-of-factly and without the vaguest hint of resentment or anger, Enjolras spluttered. Apparently this was his day for new experiences. “Th..That.” He started, and paused, gathering himself before pressing on, “That doesn’t make it better. God! It was me who _told you_ to leave!”

“Again, you’ve done so before,” replied Grantaire, and that was certainly true, hence Enjolras had been as surprised as everyone else when he had risen from his seat, taken a short bow and left the café. Feuilly and Bahorel had taken off after him once they’d recovered from the shock of his departure, but returned a few minutes later shaking their heads; the meeting hadn’t lasted much longer after that.

“I simply chose to listen to you this time.” He continued, “I am not particularly prone to doing as I’m told I’m afraid. In this case, I rather wish I hadn’t done so, I should have known Montparnasse would see an opportunity, but _you_ weren’t to know,”

“That’s not the point!” said Enjolras, and his grip on the counter top was beginning to hurt, “I told you to leave. I said… unforgivable things to you. Anyone would have left!”

“You had no reason to believe I was anything other than what you said about me,” replied Grantaire.

“Because you didn’t tell us!” cried Enjolras and it was suddenly very clear to him why he hadn’t wanted to believe Eponine’s story, “You’ve been protecting all of us, all this time, and you never said a word! You just let me accuse you of being useless, and… a large number of other things besides,” he couldn’t bring himself to say them again.

Grantaire shrugged again, and the nonchalance regarding the way he had been treated by Enjolras was beginning to grate on his nerves; and for entirely different reasons to how his actions normally sparked annoyance. “You have never said anything to me that I do not think of myself,” he replied with ease, but Enjolras felt as though he had been hit by a brick wall. He blinked as if physically stunned; was barely even breathing.

“Why?” he managed to choke out, after several minutes of particularly uncomfortable silence. Grantaire’s laugh was short, and bitter.

“Why do I think those things?” he asked, a derogatory smirk twisting onto his face, “Do you have all day?”

“No!” said Enjolras, more power behind his voice now, “Why did you come _here_? Why us? You don’t even believe in our cause, you tell us that all the time. You have spent hours talking at length on the futility of our actions. I… I have been particularly cruel to you in the past. So why, if you think we’re so naïve, did you stay? Why, with how terrible I have been to you, did you choose to continue putting up with me? Why did you label this place untouchable?” Another stretch of silence followed this question. Grantaire stared down at him sadly for a moment, and then shook his head with a half-sigh, half-laugh, turning again to stare at the dilapidated cubicles.

“If _you_ , of all people, don’t know by now…” he said, but he trailed off, and the rest of the sentence hung in the air between them.

Enjolras took a breath and, before he could over think the action, he released his vice grip on the counter with one hand and reached out to rest it on top of Grantaire’s. He waited for Grantaire’s shocked stare to move from his hand to his face before he said, “ _I’m_ sorry,” and a low whistle sounded from the door. They both jumped, and span to find the source of the whistle, and it was Grantaire who had whisked his hand from beneath Enjolras’ as though burned by it.

Courfeyrac had taken up the same position Grantaire had assumed earlier, leaning against the empty doorframe, his arms folded across his chest; he had one eyebrow quirked, a smile on his lips and pure mischievous glee in his eyes.

“Combeferre sent me to make sure you hadn’t murdered R,” he said cheerfully, and Enjolras glared.

“Who’s he sending to make sure I don’t murder you!” he replied through gritted teeth, gesturing at the long abandoned bottle of acetone; at the same time, imagining some rather more creative uses for it.

Courfeyrac laughed unconcernedly, “Feuilly,” he said, and he began backing out of the doorway, “But you know, carry on with your apology, and don’t let me interrupt this historic event. I’ll just go back and make sure everyone knows the world must be about to end or something,” and before Enjolras could make his move to strangle his _former_ best-friend, he had disappeared from sight with a cackle and left the two of them, one sat and one stood, in yet another uncomfortable silence.

After almost a minute in which neither could quite bring themselves to look at the other, Grantaire cleared his throat loudly and hopped off the counter top.

“You’re leaving?” Enjolras asked immediately, half-surprised by the slightly panicked note to his voice. Grantaire stared at him again in surprise, from where he was half bent down to pick up the abandoned bucket on the floor.

“No,” he said slowly, “I was going to refill this, it’ll have gone cold.”

“Oh,”

“I can leave you to do it yourself if you’d like?” he continued, and Enjolras found he had to make a particular effort not to shake his head too fast.

“You don’t have to leave,” he said, and Grantaire laughed and he went about emptying the bucket – stained red water splashing into the sink – and setting the hot water tap running into it.

“Trust me, Montparnasse won’t be back any time soon,” he said, smiling widely; there was something triumphant in his eyes that Enjolras had never seen before.

“Good,” he said, “But that’s not why I… I don’t _want_ you to leave,”

“Yeah?” asked Grantaire, and he shouldn’t have had that slightly unsure look in his eyes; like at any moment Enjolras might change his mind and take it back. “Was it that boring having nobody to disagree with you?” he added, clearly joking.

“Yes,” replied Enjolras honestly, not having realised it until it was out of his mouth. In truth, he hadn’t noticed quite how much he had altered the meetings, and indeed himself, over the past few months, to fit around Grantaire’s constant running commentaries; until they were gone that was. He would find himself stood in silence for several seconds at a time, a rebuttal on the tip of his tongue for an argument or a disagreement that never came. Meetings had finished earlier than usual with fewer interruptions, there had been less time wasted on nonsense tales; there had been much less laughter too. He had missed it without even realising it was missing. He had, he realised, missed Grantaire himself; and far more than he would like to admit.

Grantaire swallowed and coughed and looked away; apparently uncomfortable with the way Enjolras was staring at him. He turned the tap off, and placed the now full bucket on the floor before crossing over to where Enjolras had slammed down the acetone. The lid came off with one smooth twist, a movement that apparently required no effort at all, and he handed the bottle back to Enjolras.

“There,” he said, “Just, put a little bit on a couple of cloths, I’ll be… I’ll be back in a moment,” and then he was headed out the door and around the corner out of sight before Enjolras could ask what on earth he’d done or said this time. When, after waiting for several seconds, he didn’t hear the door at the end of the corridor open or close, he made his own way out into the corridor and found Grantaire sitting on the floor with his back to the wall. He glanced up, and drew his legs up from where they were spread out the full width of the corridor.

“Missing something?” he asked, looking over towards the door, behind which there came a sudden burst of laughter. Three guesses what that was all about, Enjolras sighed and shook his head.

“Not precisely,” he said, “You?”

“Just needed a moment,” he replied, running his hand through black curls.

“I uh… Shit,” he was really going to have to work on this whole apology thing, because this was embarrassing, “Did I do something? Again?”

Grantaire blinked, “Huh? No,” he said, confused, but when Enjolras huffed and folded his arms across his chest in frustration, he pushed himself to his feet, reaching a tentative – and still shaking – hand to rest on his shoulder. “No,” he said again, and slapped on a grin, “Honestly Enjolras, this is just me, being my usual pathetic self, don’t worry about it,”

“How am I supposed to not worry about it when you say it like that?” snapped Enjolras, incredulous. He had definitely used the word pathetic at some point in his outburst the week before. The self-deprecating smile fell from Grantaire’s face, to Enjolras’ relief; it didn’t suit him. “You… you ‘need a moment’, just from being in the same room as me? And I’m not supposed to be concerned about that?” he asked, “Well, I am concerned okay. Because, I screwed up, and I _will_ admit that admitting that I was wrong is _not_ something I am used to, so, far from walking out of rooms to avoid being alone with me for extended periods of time, I’m going to need your help here to fix… this,” and he gestured wildly between the two of them. Grantaire’s hand fell from his shoulder, and he took a step back shrugging and folding his own arms.

“Nothing to fix,” he stated, his tone cagey, his body closed off.

“Clearly, there is!” Enjolras snapped.

Grantaire’s eyes closed, and he took a long deep breath in and out again before opening them. When he did, he walked purposefully past Enjolras, past the men’s bathroom, all the way to the opposite end of the corridor, and pushed open the door to the kitchen; which had miraculously survived the onslaught. Enjolras followed silently after him. The kitchen itself had not survived particularly well, however the large collection of sharp implements that had been scattered hazardously across the floor had been one of the first things cleared carefully away; leaving a thankfully risk free floor space. Grantaire was currently pacing across it.

Enjolras allowed him to do so in silence for a full minute before letting out an aggravated sigh. “Look, will you just tell me what to say to make this better, because I’ve got nothing here,” he said. He half expected some sort of quip in response to that, but all Grantaire did was stop walking back and forth and instead turn his head to stare at the ceiling.

“Grantaire…”

“I’m a mess!”

Enjolras blinked, and was about to respond, but Grantaire held up a silencing hand; he still hadn’t looked away from the ceiling.

“No, shut up, you asked me what was wrong… in a manner of speaking… so I’m telling you. I’m a mess.” He said, and he shook his head and leant back against a table, “I have been a mess for a very long time, and I will likely continue to be a mess for a long time to come. My being a completely useless, pathetic, drunken waste of space is not something new, my knowing about it is not to do with anything you have ever said, and you are not the first – nor will you be the last – to say it to me. I can’t explain to you why I left that evening, in the same way that I can’t explain why I sometimes wax lyrical on subjects, I didn’t even realise I remembered studying, or why I can’t keep my idiotic mouth closed when you’re discussing important subjects, or how in hell I was able to knock out a mountain troll of a man whilst inebriated beyond all reason. I can’t explain why I didn’t come back, and I can’t explain why I walked into one of Montparnasse and his goons regular haunts three evenings in a row. Sometimes I do shit I don’t intend to do… and it’s not even because I’m drunk, because half the time I’ve not consumed nearly enough to be incoherent; sometimes I’m even horrifically sober. It’s more like I have this pathological need to screw up every good thing in my life, every time I realise I’ve got one. Like just now for instance. You know that’s one of the most civil conversations we’ve ever had, hell you used the word ‘sorry’ which, I’m fairly sure so rarely passes your lips unironically we should probably declare a national holiday. Then like an idiot, I get all overwhelmed and decide it’s a good idea to just walk out for no reason and sit spread-eagled on the floor, right outside where, of course you’re going to find me, and of course you’re going to wonder why I’m doing it. And of course you’d choose now to develop a martyr complex for something other than all your causes, and blame yourself for my being screwed up in the head. Well, stop, okay. You’ve apologised for what you said in the past, fine, I forgive you, if that was what you needed. I forgive you, even though to my mind pointing out the truth in a person shouldn’t be considered a capital offence. Now you can stop worrying, stop apologising or at least wondering whether you should be apologising, or how to properly apologise; I could see the little cogs in your brain ticking away: Trying to solve things that don’t need solving and wanting to fix things that are broken beyond repair. Because that’s you all over isn’t it,” and he finally looked down, turned sad eyes on Enjolras who hadn’t realised he’d been holding his breath the whole time.

He let it out in a rush, feeling dizzy, as Grantaire barrelled on, “You find a problem, and you can’t stand it. Problems don’t exist in the world you’ve created in your mind. The one you’re trying to create here. So when you find one, it needs to be solved, and as soon as possible. The idea that some things can’t be fixed doesn’t seem to process for you. And stop looking so angry, I didn’t say it was a bad thing to live believing that. It’s what you do; it’s what makes you who you are. It’s what makes you so much _more_ than anyone else I’ve ever met in my whole pathetic life. It’s what makes me love you so much it physically hurts to be close to you sometimes. Maybe it’s what makes me do the truly spectacularly stupid shit I do here, another of my desperate attempts to destroy every piece of light in my dark little corner, or at least keep it far enough away that it doesn’t blind me.” He laughed bitterly, “But you won’t go _away_! I tried. That first time I came to the Musain, and saw you speak, I decided not to come back again. I wasn’t going to! But then it was impossible. I heard Montparnasse plotting to crash your next meeting, so instead I used whatever dumb luck I’d had to not get beaten to a pulp to warn him off. It meant that I would have to keep coming back here, would have to see you every few days, would have to listen to your voice and let you fool me for a few glorious moments at a time into believing in something again. And it was worth it, even though you hated me, even though everyone else only tolerated me, you were all safe, so it was worth it. In fact it was the only worthwhile thing I’ve ever done in my life, and now I’ve let myself mess that up too, and for no reason; because I fell too far and let myself get hurt by the truth,”

Enjolras couldn’t say when it was precisely that the tears had started to fall across his cheeks, anymore than he would later be able to tell you how he’d gone from hovering beside the doorway stunned and shaking, watching Grantaire talk, to wrapping the man in his arms, crying and whispering “Stop!” brokenly into the juncture between his neck and his shoulder. He supposed he might be getting a taste of what it was like to do something potentially stupid without knowing why he was doing it. What he did know was that he couldn’t stand to hear another word of… whatever that was.

Grantaire did stop. He stopped so entirely that his whole body went rigid beneath Enjolras; there was only a barely noticeable rise and fall in his chest to prove he was still breathing. Enjolras let his arms fall to his sides, but he didn’t pull back, keeping his head rested on Grantaire’s shoulder.

“Just stop please,” he said again with a sigh, even though nothing had been said out loud for several seconds already. He drew in a sharp breath, tears still trickling into the material of Grantaire’s shirt, “I’m sorry,” he whispered shakily, “I thought I meant it, when I said it, but I didn’t. I wouldn’t hate myself for it if I did. I know that won’t change what you think of yourself, but I need you to know it’s not what I think of you, and it’s not what they think of you either. They’re all mad at me you know, they all blame me, and they should they absolutely should. I don’t know why I… No I do! You're right. I can’t stand it. I can't stand it when the world isn't working the way I wish it would. I can’t stand things not fitting neatly into boxes and files and carefully constructed timeframes. I’m fighting for a free world and I acted like a dictator, like those I despise. All because I can't stand that I don’t understand you; because you don’t _fit_. Because you are a mass of contradictions. Sometimes when you talk you reveal how much knowledge you have, and I don’t understand why you pretend to be stupid the other eighty percent of the time. I don’t understand the drinking. You act as if you consider us friends, and yet you jeer at our beliefs. You talk sometimes about art and life and love at one moment with such passion and then the next with such cynicism. It’s as if you want to believe in them but refuse to. I don’t understand how you can have given up so completely on everything.”

“Not quite everything,” murmured Grantaire gently, and Enjolras lifted his head to look at his face. He didn’t need to explain, his eyes said everything. His own eyes broke contact, and flickered downward. He moved forward on an instinct he’d rarely felt before, but Grantaire turned his head slightly and he paused, barely an inch left to separate them.

“You don’t have to,” he whispered, dipping his head and training his gaze onto the floor, “I already told you, I was already broken,”

Enjolras moved to lean their foreheads together.

“I don’t want to fix you,” he promised softly, one hand coming up to rest lightly against a rough cheek, “I want to understand you,” and after a moment Grantaire finally relaxed beneath him, and he felt rather than heard the whispered ‘okay’ before closing the distance between them.

It wasn’t fireworks, and it wasn’t ‘where has this been all my life’, it was probably a lot drier and tasted saltier than maybe it should have done. Enjolras had had so few experiences like this he could count them on one hand, and Grantaire seemed reluctant to take the lead. But it was real; and as far as first kisses go, that seemed to be the most important thing. They would have time to get to ‘mind-blowing’ and ‘breath-taking’, for now it was more important for it to let it be what it was; to let it be truthful. 

**Author's Note:**

> Loosely based on a tumblr post about Grantaire being a sort of secret shield for the Musain and its regulars with regards to the Patron Minette. Original to be found here: http://beautifulcarlostaire.tumblr.com/post/58274141102
> 
> As you can see, I strayed slightly from the original premise. What was fully intended to be light-hearted and about 1000 words quickly got away from me and now it's this. I hope you all like it anyway.
> 
> Gratuitous use of Oscar WIlde for the title. 
> 
> Also, one day, some day, I will learn to write proper kiss scenes that don't make me hate myself, for being overly cliche, and they won't end up deleted and you'll all love me.


End file.
